


The Minister's Cat

by riverlight



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Cats, Gen, Humor, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-01-21
Updated: 2006-01-21
Packaged: 2017-10-17 07:14:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/174259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riverlight/pseuds/riverlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rodney asks General O'Neill whether pets will be allowed in Antarctica. "McKay," O'Neill says, "we're going to an <i>alien world </i>through a <i>stargate."</i></p><p>"So, that's a no?" Rodney says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Minister's Cat

**Author's Note:**

> Stargate Atlantis, gen, 1500 words. Serious thanks go to isiscolo, etben, and threequarters for beta. You guys kicked my ass over this, and not only is the story much better than it would have been without your help, but you also taught me something about writing. Seriously—thanks.

The cat shows up out of nowhere; Rodney comes home and it's sitting there on his doorstep, huddled out of the rain. Rodney's cold and wet and hypoglycemic as hell, and he's in no mood to deal with some kid's lost pet. "What do you want?" he asks it. The cat meows piteously.

It's not wearing a collar. "Oh, hell," Rodney says. The cat sits there, bedraggled and miserable-looking. It meows again. "All right, all right, fine," Rodney says, giving in. "But only for the night, got it?"

The cat ignores him. He opens the door, and it darts inside, leaving little wet footprints on the tile. When he turns around, it's sitting there at his feet, looking pleased. "And I suppose you're hungry, too?" he asks it. It stands up and trots ahead of him into the kitchen.

* * *

It jumps up on the counter while he's rummaging for the takeout menu. "Off, off, off!" Rodney says, shoving at it until it leaps down again. It looks at him reprovingly. "Hold your horses, I have to eat, I'm hypoglycemic," he tells it, but it looks unmoved, staring haughtily at him from under the table while he calls in his order.

He gives it a can of tuna fish and a dish of milk; it sniffs the food warily but then gulps it down. When it's done, it comes over and twines around his ankles, purring. "Yes, yes," Rodney says. "Very generous of me, you'll love me forever, I get it. Enjoy it while you can, bucko, it's back on the streets for you tomorrow."

When he reaches down to pet it, it dashes back under the table and hisses as him. "Oh, fine," Rodney says, insulted. "I'm going to go be busy in the other room. You can stay here alone, see if I care."

* * *

When he comes back an hour later, it's still there, curled up in the draft from the heating vents. It looks up when he comes in. "All right, all right, fine, but we're going to establish the rules right off," he says. "First, no knocking over the potted plants. Second, the remote control is mine. Third, you stay off the bed. Fourth—I can't remember the fourth, but I'm sure it was reasonable; you just behave and we'll be all right. Yes?" The cat blinks sleepily up at him. "Well?" he asks. It doesn't move.

"Those are my terms, and they're non-negotiable," Rodney tells it. The cat, true to form, ignores him.

"Great," Rodney says sourly. "This looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

* * *

He shuts it in the kitchen, on the theory that that's where it can do the least damage. There are no plants for it knock over, his cabinets all have nice secure latches, he doesn't have any dangerous chemicals lying around, and there's a nice tile floor in case the cat should be so rude as to make a mess in the house. He's only been in bed for five minutes when it starts meowing.

"You've got to be kidding me!" he yells.

The cat starts making scratching noises on the kitchen door. "Oh, God," Rodney says, and gets up to let it out.

"Okay," he says to it. "Let's make a deal. The bed is mine. You can have the floor. I'll even give you a pillow." He tosses a pillow off the foot of the bed.

The cat spends the next ten minutes investigating every flat surface in Rodney's bedroom. When it's done, it leaps onto the bed and starts kneading at the blankets with its paws. It spends the rest of the night curled up on Rodney's stomach.

* * *

The next morning, the cat is waiting for him in the kitchen. "You really can't stay here, you know," he says to it. It looks at him reproachfully.

He looks outside. It's still raining and the radio is announcing a flood watch. "Okay, okay, okay!" he says. "I'm an asshole, but I'm not that much of an asshole." The cat rubs against his legs, purring its head off, until he pours it the last of the milk.

After work, he stops at a pet store on the way home and buys a litterbox.

* * *

The cat's not all that bad to have around, really. It doesn't make messes, and it doesn't seem to mind being left alone for most of the day. When Rodney's gone, it entertains itself, as far as he can tell, and when he's home, it curls up on the armchair and keeps him company while he works. Sometimes, when he's had a particularly bad day, it curls up on his lap and purrs. He doesn't mind this nearly as much as he thought he would.

* * *

It takes to sleeping in his laundry basket, so sometimes Rodney goes to work covered in cat hair. "Great, this is just great!" he yells at it, one morning. "Just because cats are the one thing in the world I'm not allergic to doesn't mean you should feel free to get hair all over everything!"

It darts into the bedroom and hides under the bed. "Making me feel guilty doesn't help, either!" he shouts after it.

* * *

Rodney asks General O'Neill whether pets will be allowed in Antarctica. "McKay," O'Neill says, "we're going to an alien world through a stargate."

"So, that's a no?" Rodney says.

* * *

He tries to keep all his preparations a secret. Of course, the cat's completely devious; when he finds it sleeping in the middle of his "take to Antarctica" pile, he figures the jig is up. He wakes it up to explain. "It's not that I don't love you," he says. "It's just that we're going to another planet, and it wouldn't be safe for you. For all we know, the Ancients eat cats. Plus, no catnip or television or tuna fish. You'd be miserable."

It arches its back, stretching, and settles back down to sleep, right on top of his clean uniform shirt. "It wouldn't kill you to look sad, you know," Rodney informs it.

* * *

Mostly, Rodney's too busy to be homesick; he's already got ideas for three new papers just based on the information they gathered in the first week alone. He's living in a city that flew up from the ocean, where lights turn on when he walks into the room, where they fly around in invisible spaceships. He's been dreaming of this his whole life, he doesn't have time to think about anything but the fact that he's here, in Atlantis, in another galaxy, for God's sake. Even if they never get home, he's never going to regret this, never.

* * *

Sometimes, though, when he wakes up cold and terrified from a nightmare about the Wraith, lying there alone in his bed with the sheets made of some weird Ancient material and the green-tinted moonlight making strange shadows on his walls, he wishes he could have brought the cat with him.

* * *

"So, McKay, you had a cat, huh?" Ford says, after they've gotten back from the sentient mist planet. "You had a cat?"

"It was a very nice cat, I'll have you know!" Rodney says. "His name was Schrodinger."

"I can't believe you had a cat," Ford says, grinning. "That's so cute."

"I can't believe you named it Schrodinger," John says.

"What?" Rodney says. I'm a physicist. What else would I have named it? Anyway, so not the point! We just got screwed by sentient mist! Why are you all thinking about my cat?" He scowls at Ford. "And it's not cute at all. I've never been cute in my life!"

"Now, that's true," John says.

* * *

Rodney pays one of the crew members on the Daedalus two hundred dollars, American, to smuggle the cat on board.

"Rodney," Elizabeth says, when she finds out. "A cat?"

"Well, he's bringing me coffee, too," Rodney says.

"I was more concerned with the fact that you thought this was a good idea," Elizabeth says.

"Oh," Rodney says. "Well, it's too late now."

* * *

Fairly predictably, the cat spends its first few hours on Atlantis ignoring him completely in favor of thoroughly exploring his quarters and the labs.

"That money would have bought me a lot of black-market chocolate, you know, " Rodney says to it when it finally comes back to him and settles on his lap. "Just, maybe you shouldn't act so unappreciative, is all I'm saying."

* * *

Later, it curls up on his stomach the way it used to, back on Earth, and purrs madly. "All right, fine," Rodney says. "I suppose I didn't need the chocolate, anyway."


End file.
